1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a camera-enabled portable terminal. More particularly, the present invention relates to a camera-enabled portable terminal and a method for taking multi-image photographs using the camera-enabled portable terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
A portable terminal is an electronic device implemented with functions, such as wireless communications, using various application programs. Exemplary portable terminals include Personal Mobile Communication Services Terminals, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), Smart Phones, International Mobile Telecommunication 2000 (IMT-2000) terminals, and wireless local area network (WLAN) terminals.
Portable terminals have been developed to support various services such as video communications, electronic diaries, voice and image recording, Internet access, and entertainment. In recent years, portable terminals equipped with digital cameras have become widely used. Portable terminals equipped with digital cameras enable the user to take motion or still pictures, use the taken pictures as background images of the terminal's display, and transmit the images to other devices.
For such purposes, the portable terminal is provided with a camera for capturing images and a display module for displaying the image captured by the camera. The camera may be implemented with either a charge coupled device (CCD) or a complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) sensor, and the display module may be implemented with a liquid crystal display (LCD).
Recently, portable terminals have been equipped with a camera that is capable of taking photos and displaying more than one of photos on a single screen of the display module at the same time.
FIG. 1 is a flowchart for explaining a multi-image photographing method of the conventional camera-enabled portable terminal and FIG. 2A to FIG. 2C are screen shots illustrating steps of processing the images captured by the camera-enabled portable terminal.
Referring to FIG. 1, the camera-enabled portable terminal enters a camera mode at step S11 and switches to a multi-image photographing mode upon a multi-image processing command being inputted at step S13. In the multi-image photographing mode, the portable terminal displays a preview image, taken by the camera, on the full screen of the display module and shows a status indication icon at a predetermined area at step S15. The status indication icon shows the operational status of the multi-image photographing mode. An exemplary predetermined area includes the side or bottom area of the screen. The status indication icon is shown at the bottom area of the screen in FIG. 2A to FIG. 2C.
Once a photographing command is inputted, while the preview image and the multi-image processing icon are presented on the screen, the preview image is captured at step S17. Whenever an image is captured, the portable terminal determines whether or not the number of images captured by the portable terminal is equal to the number of the windows formed by partitioning the screen at step S19. If it is determined that the number of images is not equal to the windows, the portable terminal displays the status indication icon representing the present status of the respective windows, as shown in FIG. 2A and FIG. 2B, and displays the preview image on the whole screen at step S21.
On the other hand, if it is determined that the number of images is equal to the number of windows, the portable terminal displays the images filled out in the respective windows on the whole screen as shown in FIG. 2C at step S23. After all the images for filling out the windows are captured, the portable terminal determines whether or not a frame refresh command is inputted while the images are displayed on the screen at step S25. If there is no frame refresh command, the portable terminal determines whether or not a save command is inputted at step S29. If the save command is inputted, the portable terminal saves the images filled out in the windows as a single frame at step S31.
If the frame refreshment command is inputted at step S25, the portable terminal clears the images displayed on the screen at step S27 and carries out steps of S15 to S25.
However, the conventional multi-image photographing method of the camera-enabled portable terminal has a drawback in that it is impossible to check the respective images before all of the images for filling out the windows are captured. This is because all the images captured for forming a single frame are displayed and checked after all the images are captured.
Also, in the conventional multi-image photographing method of the camera-enabled portable terminal, all the images captured for filling out the frame are discarded and retaken even when only one image is required to be changed since a refresh is performed on a frame basis.
Accordingly, there is a need for an improved multi-image photographing method and camera-enabled portable terminal that is capable of processing respective images for the formation of a single frame, and is capable of independently editing the images constituting a frame after all the images are framed on the screen.